to give up the sea
by tmitnaiael
Summary: Her skin beneath his hand blisters in that same aching–pleasing way a bow does.


**note** alternate universe in which sansa is the firstborn and robb is second

* * *

He has spent too long practicing in the yard and now there is a fascinating sort of ache beneath his palm. There will be a blister there this time tomorrow. He is rubbing it with two fingers when he turns the corner and nearly runs into Sansa. She extends an arm, as though to brace herself from a collision. He catches her palm, pulls it to his chest with two hands.

"Have you seen Joff? We're meant to go riding."

From the mirth in her eyes he knows she is not looking for an answer. Her newest hobby is reminding all who cross her path that she is betrothed to a prince. She is especially wroth, it seems, to let him forget. As if he cares.

She's so slight it takes only one hand flat to her ribs to push her to the wall.

"We've got to stop this," she murmurs, but as she says it she's tracing a finger along his jawline, an invitation that he takes.

Her skin beneath his hand blisters in that same aching–pleasing way a bow does.

* * *

"He is a prince," Sansa says, smiling as she pulls needle through cloth. Practicing my lions, she had told him. The thought makes him frown.

"He is just a dumb brute." He kicks her chair lightly. "A stupid boy. When he makes to consummate your marriage, he is like to prick you with his with that Lion's Tooth of his and not his cock—if he's got a proper one—, for want of knowing the difference."

Sansa is wasted on him.

She ignores that, as he expects. "Some day I shall be a queen and you shan't be allowed to kick my chair." She looks down at him with a haughty disapproval he revels in. All forms of contempt are beautiful on her.

"Time was, you were my queen." They had run on the grounds, playing at Lords and Ladies, princesses and monsters. One time she had been his saltwife, but perhaps neither of them had really understood what that meant.

She smiles. "I _will_ be your queen. I shall be the queen of all the people of Westeros.

"Oh, but you're right though. He's only Robb's age, still a boy." She sighs and lays her needlework in her lap, watching as he creases the folds in her dress between thumb and forefinger. "Stop that; you'll ruin it. In a few years we shall marry and by then he shall be a man, gallant and—"

Theon groans, kicking her chair hard to make her yelp.

* * *

It is well after dark when he reaches his chambers. He has just returned from fucking one of the kitchen girls and her lusty married sister, twice and thrice respectively. Doughy girls, with crooked teeth and ample teats.

He has barred his door and is sniffing loudly, wondering if he smells of bread, or only sex, if the cunts of women acquire the smell of their cooking, when he realizes Sansa is in his bed. A welcome sight, any night, and one he has not seen in a long time. But she is weeping. Noiseless sobs dampening his mattress.

He kicks off his boots and shucks his clothes, leaving his smallclothes for her comfort, and slips in beside her. She is chill even under the furs, more Northron than she thinks herself.

Theon touches his lips to the crown of her head, to her brow, but when he makes for her lips she rolls away. He refrains from pulling her back and taking his kiss, from drawing up her gown and fucking her sorrow away.

"It's Snow's wolf they should have killed, if any," he offers. Truthfully the Queen doesn't have the wrong of it. Theon has seen these direwolves, cracking bones like twigs to suck marrow. The beasts were all dangerous, even Sansa's Lady, but there is something disturbing about a wolf that does not howl.

She makes no indication of having heard that. "It wasn't Lady. Lady did nothing wrong."

"I know, sweetling." Her back is to him. He tugs the tie from her plait and unravels it with clumsy fingers. She will be upset with him, in the morn, and gripe about knots in her hair even in her grief, but that is inconsequential to the now, to the strange pleasure he derives from pulling her hair, always gently, and seeing what pressure will cause her to flinch or when she will tire and shake herself from his grasp.

"Then you'll not be wanting to wed our golden prince anymore, I suspect? But for him, this very night you would have Lady for a bed–mate and not I." Not reason enough, sadly, to like the boy.

Sansa raises herself up and turns, bewildered. "Why would I want not to marry Joffrey? It's not his fault, it was Arya. If she hadn't—"

"Yes, yes." He sighs. "It's always Arya's fault."

She presses her face into a pillow. He is disappointed, should have liked to kiss the salt from her cheeks himself and thought to taste the sea.

Her voice is muffled. "I hate her."

That makes him laugh. Sometimes he is struck by just how different she is from him, this almost–sister of his. "Sansa, you do not not know hate. You don't understand it and haven't any to give. It is the Queen you should hate, and Joffrey. Your father as well.

"I like it, though. That you are incapable of hate. You wouldn't be—" my "—Sansa elsewise.

"But I've enough hate for the both of us, you sweet, stupid girl. Where you can't hate, I will."

A low moan, a sigh that could mean anything. She is half–asleep. He doesn't think she's heard.

He slides an arm beneath her and remarks, "You've gotten fat."

Her sob, half–gasp, dies and is reborn the saddest laugh.

* * *

He can remember, still, the smell of her blood, the irrational thought that she would die.

She has given her maidenhead to a horse and for the past three days Sansa has lain in bed. Nearly the whole castle has been at her beck, none so much as him. If it's not _Theon, sing for me_, then it's _Theon, braid my hair_ or _Theon fetch me a lemon cake_.

Her fingers brush his as he hands the the plate. Lemon cake to break her fast though—possibly even because—Lady Catelyn has expressly forbidden it.

She takes just two bites and her toes find his thigh. "Another one, please."

"No."

"Please?"

"No."

"Oh, Theon, don't be cruel. You would not _believe_ how I ache."

He's half–jesting when he leans forward, placing his hand on her thigh. "I could soothe away your soreness… if it please you."

He does not know it, could not know it, but his eyes are bright and dark at once, and looking into them she feels lightheaded. "Yes," she says quietly, expectantly.

Theon has to hold himself back at that, with great difficulty. "Yes _what_, my lady?"

"What?"

"Your manners. Or do you remember them only when lemon cakes are involved?"

"Oh, yes, please." Her voice is strangled.

She is slick against his fingers and it is a feeling he discovers he loves as much as the chafe of wind, or the smell of the sea—maybe even more.

* * *

Afterwards he feeds her the rest of the cake. She licks it from her fingers sweetly and he is maddeningly hard, is nearly spilling in his breeches at the thought that she can taste herself.

"Sansa let me—" he can't remember what it's called, when you're with a lady, so he says, "—fuck you."

She is his but first she is a Stark, a lady.

Her answer is the one he expects.

* * *

Sansa has been crying. Her eyes are red and she's trying to sniffle discreetly. Ladies must not be allowed to cry.

He chucks her under the chin. "Brave girl. You could be Ironborn."

(He can't let himself think about that, though.)

"I thought you could come to King's Landing with me. I thought… I don't know why, it seems so silly now…."

They are sending him back to the Iron Islands. To his family, they say, but Sansa has been his only family for years now.

"Are you glad?"

He should be happy—he is happy—and yet—

How unfair it is, that he must give up Sansa for the sea.


End file.
